The invoice went out on time. The work was delivered, and nobody complained. Now it’s 60 days past due, the accounts-payable contact has stopped replying, and your payroll doesn’t care whose fault that is.
Here’s the short answer: collecting an unpaid commercial invoice is a sequence, not a single move. Diagnose why the payment is late — the reason decides the play. Escalate on a written schedule rather than by mood: reminder, firm follow-up, documented final notice. Make the debt provable while the people who approved the work still work there. And when your own leverage runs out, place the account rather than let it age. In Texas most commercial contract and open-account claims run four years from accrual (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.004) — but the practical window closes long before the legal one does.
One clarification: this is about business-to-business invoices. Consumer collection is a different legal universe, and none of what follows is written for it.
Start by naming the reason you aren’t being paid
Five explanations cover most of it, and each calls for a different response. You’ll see confident percentages attached to these categories all over the internet; we don’t publish them, because we can’t verify them.
- They forgot. A quick, embarrassed reply the moment you reach a human. Send one clear reminder with the invoice attached and an easy way to pay; heavier contact here loses a good customer over an oversight.
- They’re short on cash. Requests for extensions, partial payments, “can we work something out?” Get a written schedule with dates and amounts, and treat a missed installment as a default, not a reason to start over.
- They’re disputing something. A scope or quality objection that surfaces only after the due date. Split the disputed portion from the undisputed one and ask for payment on the part nobody contests; manufactured disputes collapse under that question.
- They’re avoiding you. Unreturned calls, promises that quietly expire, a moving target of who approves payment. Stop spending your own hours — this is the profile third-party collection exists for.
- They can’t pay. Permanent voicemail, a lapsed entity registration, or the same principals reappearing under a new name. Move now: recovery here is a race between creditors, and skip tracing decides who’s still in it.
The pattern: files rarely stay in the first category. They migrate toward the last two, quietly.
Run an escalation schedule, not a feeling
Adjust the day counts to your terms. The point is that each step is scheduled in advance and happens whether or not you feel like making the call.
| Window | Move | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Days 1–7 past due | Reminder email with the invoice; one call | Remove friction, assume good intent |
| Days 8–30 | Firmer written notice; call the decision-maker, not the AP inbox | Get a date, in writing |
| Days 31–60 | Final notice by certified mail, return receipt | Build a record you can prove |
| Day 60 and beyond | Place the account, or decide to write it off | Stop spending your own margin |
Two details do most of the work.
Reach the person who can authorize payment. Accounts payable is a queue, not a decision. Ask for a specific commitment — an amount and a date — and confirm it in writing the same day. An undocumented promise didn’t happen.
Send the final notice so you can prove it arrived. Certified mail, return receipt, listing the invoices, the amount, the supporting documents, and one date. Then say only what you will actually do:
Invoice #1042, for $0,000.00, remains unpaid as of [date]. If payment is not received by [date], we will refer this account to a third-party commercial collection agency and submit it for legal review through counsel.
Then follow through on the date you named: a deadline you let slide teaches the debtor what your next one is worth. And leave out any threat you can’t or won’t execute.
Make the debt provable before you escalate
Whoever works this file next — you, an agency, or an attorney — is only as strong as the documentation:
- The invoice, plus the contract, purchase order, or signed proposal behind it
- Proof of delivery or completion, and any written acceptance or sign-off
- The payment history, including partial payments and NSF items
- All correspondence, especially anything where the debtor acknowledges the balance
- Your written terms on late fees, interest, and recovery of collection costs
That last line matters: late fees, interest, and collection-cost recovery are generally available only if your agreement provides for them, and permissible rates are a legal question — have counsel confirm your language before you rely on it.
The decision at 60 to 90 days
Four honest options:
- Keep working it in-house. No fee, but it costs your team’s time — and by now you’re repeating a message the debtor has decided to ignore.
- Place it with a commercial collection agency. On contingency there’s no upfront cost, so the comparison is recovered-money-minus-fee against a likely write-off. When to send a commercial account to collections walks through the signals.
- Sue. For balances that justify the cost, with strong documentation. It is legal work, performed by attorneys — and a judgment is the beginning of collection, not the end.
- Write it off. Sometimes correct, against a dissolved shell with nothing reachable. Make it a decision, not something that happens because nobody escalated.
Legal routes, and what Texas actually gives you
Suit and judgment. Texas justice courts handle smaller civil matters, with a statutory ceiling on the amount in controversy — confirm the current limit before you file. Larger claims go to county or district court. Filing and appearing are legal work: an agency cannot do them for you.
Enforcement is its own project, and Texas has a feature that surprises creditors: current wages for personal services are exempt from garnishment for ordinary debts (Tex. Prop. Code § 42.001(b)(1)), so the “we’ll garnish his paycheck” plan doesn’t exist here. A company has no wages, though — its bank accounts are reachable by ordinary post-judgment garnishment (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ch. 63). A recorded abstract of judgment creates a lien on the debtor’s non-exempt real property in that county, running 10 years from recording and dying early if the judgment goes dormant (Tex. Prop. Code § 52.006). A turnover order reaches non-exempt property ordinary process can’t, including future rights to property (§ 31.002). Mechanics: how to collect a judgment in Texas.
If the invoice is for construction work, you may also have lien rights — and they don’t run on a rolling 60- or 90-day clock. Texas deadlines count from the month you furnished labor or materials and land on the 15th: for a sub or supplier on a non-residential project, notice to the owner and original contractor by the 15th day of the third month, the lien affidavit by the 15th day of the fourth (Tex. Prop. Code §§ 53.056, 53.052). Residential runs one month shorter at each step, and suit to foreclose must be brought within one year of the last day the affidavit could have been timely filed (§ 53.158). Confirm your dates with construction counsel — see the Texas lien deadline reference and general contractor won’t pay.
What changes when an agency takes the file
- The letterhead changes the arithmetic. A third party in the file tells the debtor the account has left your customer-service queue.
- In-person contact. When other collectors give up, we show up. A field visit is hard to route to voicemail, and it’s the part of unpaid invoice collection most agencies don’t do.
- Skip tracing and asset investigation. Locating a debtor who moved, dissolved, or reopened under a new name — and establishing what’s realistically collectable before anyone spends money chasing it.
- Legal escalation through counsel. ASA is a collection agency, not a law firm. Where an account warrants suit, it goes to our network of licensed collection attorneys in the debtor’s jurisdiction. We never give legal advice or engage in the unauthorized practice of law.
- No emotional freight, and no upfront cost. You’re frustrated; a collector is methodical. We work on contingency — no recovery, no fee — and we’re bonded as a third-party collector in Texas (Tex. Fin. Code § 392.101).
We’ve recovered over $250 million for clients across 25+ years, with a 70%+ recovery rate on accounts we accept. That’s a track record, not a prediction about your file: some accounts aren’t collectable, and we’d rather say so.
The clock nobody puts on a calendar
Four years is the statutory outer edge for most Texas commercial claims (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.004) — see the statute of limitations breakdown for how accrual and partial payments interact with it.
The more useful question is what changes while a file sits. We won’t put a monthly decay percentage on it, because we’ve never found one that traces to a verifiable source. The direction is consistent, though: the contact who approved the work leaves, addresses go stale, records get archived, other creditors get in line ahead of you, and the debtor’s reason to negotiate weakens. Age doesn’t just lower the odds — it removes the tools.
Prevention beats collection every time
Vet new customers before extending terms — trade references and a commercial credit check cost less than one write-off. Put the terms in writing: due date, late-fee and interest provision, recovery of collection costs and attorney’s fees, and a personal guarantee where the exposure justifies asking. Invoice the day the work is done, with the PO number their system needs. And stop work when an account goes past due, because delivering into non-payment is how a collectable invoice becomes an uncollectable one.
Where to start today
- Pull the file — invoice, contract or PO, proof of delivery, payment history, and every message about the balance.
- Put the follow-up, final-notice, and placement dates on the calendar before you need them.
- Send the final notice by certified mail, with one deadline and only the consequences you intend to carry out.
- Place the account when that date passes unpaid, while the trail is still warm.
Sitting on invoices a business customer has decided to ignore? Get a free case review — no recovery, no fee. This article is general information for commercial creditors, not legal advice. Deadlines and remedies depend on your contract, your state, and your facts — confirm them with qualified counsel.
General information for commercial creditors, not legal advice. Laws and deadlines change and depend on the facts — confirm specifics with qualified counsel.